Standing
as the crown jewel of Mysore, Chamundi
Hills is the abode of all powerful Goddess, Chamundi
or Chamundeswari. A motorable
road, besides a flight of 1,000 steps, take the visitors to its
top, where stands the beautiful tall Gopuram of the temple, one
of the best examples of the Dravidian school of architecture.
The hill rises to a height of 3,489 feet. Half-way to it, near
the steps and the road, there is a beautiful 16-foot monolith
statue ofNandi, carved in
granite, black because of regular anointing with oil and other
sacred waters. The beautiful carved statue was a gift by the Maharaja,
DoddaDevaraja
Wodeyar, in 1659.
Nearby the Chamundi Temple is the Lalithadri
Palace, used by the former
Mysore Maharajas, whenever they visited the Hills, for worshipping
the Goddess, their home deity, in the temple. By the side of the
famous Chamundi Temple, there
is another temple, the temple of Mahabaleswara.
In fact, Mahabaleswara, Ishwara in the form of Linga, is the oldest
temple on the hill. The hill was earlier called Mahabaladri, after
Mahabaleswara. This temple was a gift by the Vijayanagar King
Vishnuvardhana in 1128
A.D. As one approaches the road towards the temple,
there is a huge statue of monster Mahishasura. There is a small
township on the hill. State Government buses (KSRTC) ply regularly
to the temple from Mysore City.